


Eighteen Then.

by wisia



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-24
Updated: 2015-03-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 10:31:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3606846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wisia/pseuds/wisia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony didn’t think eighteen meant very much. It was just another year, but then there’s Steve.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eighteen Then.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MusicalLuna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MusicalLuna/gifts).



> I thought I wouldn’t finished this tonight, but apparently I lied. I had to stay up to finish it. It was a great need. Also, got to do a narrative style/experimental thing as I haven’t written this format before.
> 
> This is a version of musicalluna‘s fic [ "summer" ](http://musicalluna.tumblr.com/post/114466297035/summer). Because it was so good and I couldn’t resist.So yeah. I did this instead of my C-IM RBB fics. Oops.
> 
> Last part of the fic are all from musicalluna. All their words. Not mine.
> 
> Thank you for letting me play with your ideas and universe. :D

He is eighteen. Turns the digits just as the sun breaks through, sweeping hot heat throughout New York City, and declares it summer. Eighteen should be everything, but Tony Stark is a genius, don’t you know? And it’s only another year, another thing marked off like a to do list. Tony’s probably already passed eighteen once, twice, if not a hundred times over with his mind. He’s sure of it.

“Mother,” he says, stepping into the room with a slight bounce to his walk. Says it warmly and gently with a smile that could overcrowd his face. Because Tony’s only back for her. He would have stayed at MIT over the break otherwise. He has several projects lined up that needs completion. Not that he couldn’t do them at home, but it’s easier when everything is already set up over there.

“How are you today?” He edges closer, and his smile slips. The corners of that U sagging just a bit. Because Maria Stark is ill. It’s dark and dreary, and it isn’t right. Tony reaches for the curtains, but she moans and covers her eyes with an arm. The light streaming in is too much. It makes her face sallow and gaunt.

“Don’t,” she rasps, and Tony drops his hand, drops the heavy curtain too. It’s instant darkness.

“Sorry,” he says. Quickly, hastily. He goes to her side, nearer than he was before, but she turns her face away. Rubs her cheeks against the pillow where it’s wet with sweat (and tears).

“It’s fine,” she says, but Tony knows it isn’t. _She_ isn’t. So, he kneels at her side. Because he loves her, and it hurts to see her so worn down. Tony holds her hand, and he never knew how small it was in comparison to his own. Tony has always known how small she was to Howard, but not to his. For a brief moment, Tony thinks there’s something to be eighteen.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispers. “Go out and play, bambi.”

And Tony laughs. Promises it because she is sick to the point of delirium. She hasn’t called him that in ages.

“I will,” he says. He doesn’t say that he would have gone regardless. Home is boredom after all.

\---------------

He is eighteen and sitting down at the breakfast hour. Howard’s there. They usually miss each other because Howards goes to work, and Tony sleeps in. Tony ignores him. They have nothing to say, and he pokes at his eggs instead. They’ve gone cold and rubbery. Howard stares at him. Then, his lips curls into a frown. So, nothing new there. Tony pokes his eggs again.

“What are you doing home?” Howard asks as if he hasn’t registered that Tony’s been home for a week and a half now. Tony blinks.

“What do you think?” Tony knows he shouldn’t, but the words come out anyway. Knows it sounds disrespectful when he really means it plainly.

“Don’t talk to me like that,” Howard says. His voice is hard, and Tony doesn’t flinch. It’s expected.

“I came home to see mom.”

Howard snorts. “Her? What do you need to see her for? You should be at school instead of wasting your time here.”

Tony leaves before Howard can say anymore. Howard yells, but Tony goes. He doesn’t care. He really doesn’t.

\----------------------------

He is eighteen in the summer, and Tony goes around the city. Mills around. There’s a coffee shop. Tony’s already had his fix, but he heads for it anyway. The place looks cool, and it’s better than the sun outside burning the back of his neck. He can see the line is just long enough to stop at the door.

Tony swings the door open. He smacks a guy.

“Ow,” the guy says and clutches his nose. Tony’s smacked him right in the face apparently.

“Sorry,” he says and finds he can’t breathe. Tony melts in the sun and in the gaze of the prettiest blue eyes he has ever seen.

“It’s fine,” the guy says. “I’m used to it.”

Tony blinks. “Used to it? How can you be used to it?”

And he meets Steve Rogers, an artist. Tony’s weak in the knees.

“I used to get beat up a lot,” Steve admits quietly. Sheepishly. They’re tucked at a table on the edge, too close to the line and the entrance. Everyone that comes in sends a rush of warm air at them, but Tony doesn’t mind. He’s too engrossed in Steve.

“I don’t believe that,” Tony laughs, runs his finger against the straw in his cold frosted coffee. It’s sweet with caramel, and it tastes even better being with someone instead of his usual lonely self.

“I really did,” Steve says. He runs a hand through his blond hair and smiles. “I couldn’t stand the bullies.”

“You’re a knight in shining armor, aren’t you?”

Steve flushes a pretty pink, and Tony’s entranced by how the color graces those cheekbones.

“No, I’m not. I’m just an artist.”

And he doodles on the extra napkins. Sprawling cityscapes and people. Cartoons and plants.

“You’re good,” Tony admires. Steve is. In every way.

\-----------------

Tony’s eighteen, and Steve is twenty.

They spend July days carelessly. Fritters them away without thought because they have each other. They go anywhere and everywhere.

Steve takes him to the lower ends of New York. Shows him things Tony’s never seen.

“Are you serious?” Tony asks because they’re sitting on top of a dumpster. It smells. It ranks even worse because the sun hits hard and fast with spoilage.

“Yes,” Steve says. The lid is grimy, and Steve’s hand is grimy too as he tugs Tony closer to him. “Look.”

And Tony’s impressed. It’s industrial New York. Columns of smoke rises into the air, and he can hear the machines grind away.

“Okay,” Tony says. “Color me impressed. But you know this isn’t good for your lungs, right? Don’t you have asthma?”

Steve rolls his eyes. “Shut up and appreciate it.”

Tony does until he sees Stark Industries. One of their many buildings. This one makes steel, Tony thinks.

“Uh oh, what’s with that face?”

“Stark Industries over there.” He points, and Steve is puzzled for a second.

“Stark—oh, that weapon company?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t like what they stand for,” Steve says. And Tony, well—

“Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”

He kisses Steve then, sitting on trash and sweltering in the sun.

\------------------

Steve is twenty, and Tony wants. He hasn’t never met someone he revered so much as Rhodey. Except Tony wants to kiss him, wants Steve more than he could have imagined.

He lies on the carpet of Steve’s cramped apartment. Steve shares it with his best friend, Bucky.

“You got paint on me again,” Tony says. He swipes a finger across his band shirt. It’s orange. It’s bright, and it’s hella ugly. It sticks to his finger, sticky. Only part way dry. Steve huffs. He has his easel out by the window, brush painting broad strokes against the canvas. The sunlight makes him glow, and Tony’s mouth goes dry.

“Tony,” he says as if talking to a child. “I’m an artist.”

“You don’t need to live the artist stereotype though.” Tony finds another smear of paint on his left elbow. Steve glares, and Tony laughs.

“You are the artist stereotype, aren’t you?” He thinks about it as he stares up at the whirling ceiling fan. Steve flicks his paintbrush at him, and red dots Tony’s face.

“Hey!”

“You can leave if you don’t like it,” but Tony crawls into Steve’s space. Drags Steve into a kiss that only grows hotter and wetter. It’s messy and nice, and—

“Please,” Tony says. He puts his hands under Steve’s shirt, exploring.

“Not yet,” Steve says, pushing Tony’s hands away. “I want to do it right.”

But Tony’s hard, and he think he might dies if Steve doesn’t touch him.

“But—“

Steve kisses him silent.

He takes Tony later, at the end of July. Outside in the park under a wide blue Manhattan sky where the sun can slip and slide across every inch of Tony’s skin.

“I thought you want to do it right,” Tony gasps because it’s good. Steve chuckles. Right isn’t always place. It’s time and love and everything else that makes it so.

\----------------

Eighteen and twenty is floating away into a past when the air turns cool. August days are spent counting everything down to the last second. Tony holds onto Steve’s hand more tightly. Prolongs their days as they become shorter.

“You go back to school in the fall, huh,” Steve remarks quietly.

“Yeah,” Tony says, kicks his feet back and forth. They’re in the park again, and Tony blushes to think about what transpired here.

“Hm,” Steve hums. “Where do you go? I know you’re really smart. You can do all the maths.”

“MIT,” Tony says, drags it out slow between his lips. He doesn’t want to go back. He leans against Steve, pushing his weight into him. As if that would glue him to Steve’s side forever.

“I guess you’ve got to go back then,” Steve says.

“I guess.”

And then Steve moves, turns himself smoothly off the bench and in front of him. Tony stares up at him, swallows hard. The sun rings Steve like a halo, and Tony’s heart beats fast. He would stay for Steve. He would—

“This has been fun, Tony. Thank you.”

He kisses Tony on the forehead and leaves.

Tony’s heart breaks.

\--------------------

Eighteen is more than half over as Tony throws himself into school. He pats Dummy on the head, and he’s grateful that he never gave the robot speakers. Not that Dummy would tell anyone how he tries to talk to someone who isn’t there.

It’s even worse when his parents and Jarvis die.

Tony cries for them, but he also cries for Steve. Because everyone is gone, even Howard. He wasn’t the best dad, but he was still Tony’s dad.

Eighteen slips away.

Eighteen was everything.

\---------------------

Forty two is more than doubled eighteen. But it feels the same as eighteen. Especially with Steve standing there.

“This is Steve Rogers,” Pepper introduces. Steve is the latest artist whose works she’s added to her expensive collection.

“I know,” Tony says. “We’ve met.”

There are wrinkles decorating the corner of Steve’s eyes and mouth. Tony doesn’t remember seeing them, hasn’t seen them when they were both young and together, but then Steve smiles. It’s exactly like then.

“He smacked me in the face with a door,” he tells Pepper.

“Not my fault,” Tony says. “You said you were used to it too.”

Steve’s smile grows wider. Tony feels weak in the knees. Exactly the same. They end up sitting outside, on the steps catching up. It’s warm, and sweat rolls down Tony’s temple. He wants to laugh. Because it’s mid-July, and it could be one of those summer nights long ago.

“So, _how_ are you?” Tony asks. He tugs at his tie, embarrassed that he didn’t even ask after an hour in Steve’s company. “Married? Two point five kids?”

Steve smiles, looks just a little sad. He shakes his head. “No, not married. No kids. I heard you haven’t settled down either.”

“Well,” Tony says. He smooths a hand down his lapel and winks. “I’ve got a reputation to maintain, you know.”

“That’s hard to believe,” Steve laughs. Tony can’t help but grin at that honest laugh, that sound that filters his world down to nothing but Steve.

“It’s true,” Tony says as Steve’s expression turns wistful.

“Naw. You must have people hammering down your door.”

“Who, me?” Tony’s smile turns hard. Sardonic. “I’m kind of a hot mess, Steve. I guess you don’t keep up with the news still.”

“I kept up with you,” Steve huffs. His eyes are shiny in the light from the street lamp. “You were the one that got away after all.”

That couldn’t be—

“I _distinctly_ remember you breaking up with me.”

“Yeah,” Steve nods. He sighs and slips his hands into his pockets. “Stupidest thing I’ve ever done. You were young—“

“So were you!”

“—I didn’t think I could be enough for someone like you, someone so smart and good looking. Always with an eye for the future. You deserved better.”

Tony stares. His heart hammers and thuds in his chest, threatening to break the arc reactor there from how hard it’s beating. Because that’s the stupidest thing he has ever heard of, and that’s saying something. And, Tony swallows hard. Takes a step forward because if he heard Steve right then…

“Deserved? Past tense?”

A flush crawls over Steve’s cheek, clear even with the dim lighting.

“Still do. You deserve everything, Tony.”

“I don’t want everything. I just want you.”

“Tony,” Steve breaths. He looks hopeful.

“Shut up, Steve.” Because Tony doesn’t want either of them to say something they’ll both regret again. He cups Steve’s face in his hands and kisses him.

He’s forty two, and he knows now what he didn’t do at eighteen. He’s not letting Steve go.


End file.
